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Speaking of video game preservation, the National Center for the History of Electronic Games (or NCHEG) reports that noted game designer Don Daglow has taken on the role of Collections Development Consultant:

"In parallel to his work as an independent game designer and producer, Daglow will assist NCHEG in the acquisition of key objects and records to document the early and ongoing history of the development of electronic games. This effort is at the core of the NCHEG’s work to expand its prestigious collection, already the largest and most comprehensive public collection of electronic games and game-related historical materials in the United States."

The missive adds that, apart from his duties as vintage games consultant, Daglow will represent NCHEG at upcoming industry events and conferences.

The NCHEG is located in Rochester, New York's Strong National Museum of Play. Last year, the preservation initiative acquired 114 vintage arcade games that had toured with the Videotopia games exhibit.

In 2008, Daglow and others were honored with a Technology & Engineering Emmy for their work on Neverwinter Nights.

As the new year wanders along its merry path, it's time to go through the top full-length features of the past week on big sister 'art and business of gaming' site Gamasutra, plus our GameCareerGuide features for the week.

Some of the notable pieces include our mammoth reader Top Games Of The Decade, with both honorable mentions and a Top 12, plus a postmortem of neat WiiWare title Swords & Soldiers, a really smart interview with game magazine pioneer Arnie Katz, and rather more besides.

Ha ha ha:

Postmortem: Ronimo Games' Swords & Soldiers
"In this in-depth postmortem, the Dutch independent developer Ronimo Games discusses what went right -- and wrong -- in creating critically acclaimed WiiWare side-scrolling console RTS Swords & Soldiers."

Gamasutra's Top 12 Games of the Decade
"After yesterday's honorable mentions for Gamasutra's 'Game Of The Decade', as voted and commented on by hundreds of our readers, we're counting down your Top 12 games of the last ten years, from Wii Sports through The Sims all the way to the top-voted title."

Sponsored Feature: Restless Entities Never Sleep -- The Back End of Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning
"In this Intel-sponsored feature, part of the Visual Computing section, the technical experts behind Mythic and EA's Warhammer Online discuss the mechanics of keeping the MMO running across multiple servers and data centers."

Gamasutra's Games of the Decade: Honorable Mentions
"Ahead of tomorrow's list of Gamasutra's 'Game Of The Decade', as voted and commented on by hundreds of our readers, we're publishing some of the most-voted on titles that didn't quite make the Top 12 list, from Katamari Damacy to Vagrant Story and beyond."

Electronic Games: The Arnie Katz Interview
"In this in-depth interview, Gamasutra sits down with Arnie Katz, the co-creator in 1981 of Electronic Games magazine, the first ever magazine dedicated entirely to video games, to discuss his history in the biz and the state of game journalism today."

GCG: Crossing Ships
"In this feature, developer Alan Abram recalls the difficulties he faced in crossing over from university life to a full-time work placement year in the games industry."

GCG: Game Design Foundations: Game Concepts and Ideas
"Here, GameCareerGuide presents an extract from Game Design Foundations by Roger Pedersen, entitled Game Concepts and Ideas, which is designed to help you with kickstarting your own project."

Now that all the holiday issues are out from everyone, the wave of Christmas gift-giving buyer's guides is finally over for the year.

These guides are something I always dreaded writing during my editor days. They take a metric ton of time to collate, much more than when you're writing typical previews or features. You spend forever tracking down assets and figuring out what's appropriate for the guide. Then, once it's all done, you look back over the proofs and wonder to yourself (or I did, at least): "Is anyone actually going to use this? Are people besides the PR folks I talked to reading these things?"

So gift guides are always a challenge to writers, but still they come out every year, all clockwork-style and such. For example, Game Informer's December '09 issue has an eight-page guide (which is available online as well) that features games, hardware, DVDs, toys, and assorted pricey video game merchandise. It's well-executed and nice to look at, sure, but it's also not drastically different from any other gift guide you can see in competing mags, which also sport a lot of 'em.

Curious, I wondered if these print-mag gift guides have changed much in tone over the years. So, naturally, I went to the oldest video-game magazine in my collection -- the first issue of Electronic Games, dated winter 1981. Game Informer in 2009 has a "Holiday Buying Guide"; Electronic Games in 1981 had a "Holiday Gift Guide." There's one difference there, I suppose.

A few humorous comparisons:

Most Expensive Item
1981: The Champion Sensory Challenger, a standalone chess computer ($375, or $877.25 in modern dollars)
2009: A replica costume and sword for Altair from Assassin's Creed ($1111.50)

Most Embarrassing Item If Someone Actually Bought It For You
1981: A vinyl Space Invaders jacket "for the gamer who truly matters"
2009: Star Wars-themed "chopsaber" chopsticks

Most Inappropriate Gift
1981: A portable electronic horse-race analyzer
2009: The Tauntaun sleeping bag

Best Cheap Gift
1981: The $50 Casio wristwatch that actually plays a game (ooooh)
2009: The $25 remote-control Warthog

Conclusion: In 28 years, game-mag holiday gift guides have not changed at all. Yet they're still a huge pain in the ass to write. What happened to progress?

[Kevin Gifford breeds ferrets and runs Magweasel, a really cool weblog about games and Japan and "the industry" and things. In his spare time he does writing and translation for lots and lots of publishers and game companies.]

['Game Mag Weaseling' is a weekly column by Kevin Gifford which documents the history of video game magazines, from their birth in the early '80s to the current day.]

I mentioned back in August, when news of World of Warcraft: The Magazine first hit, that the only similar project ever attempted is EON, a quarterly title devoted exclusively to CCP Games' EVE Online. It's produced by MMM Publishing in London and sold exclusively on the Internet; you can buy a 4-issue subscription for $55.95 or buy any of the past 17 issues for $14.95 a pop.

I was previously aware of EON because there was a point last year when issue 1, which was sold out at CCP's online store, was going for serious premiums on eBay -- $100 and upwards, prices normally reserved for very old CGWs and Electronic Games issues in great condition. I wondered what on earth the big deal was, but I didn't investigate it further because I figured it was just crazy MMO dudes doing what crazy MMO dudes do: pay tons of money for collectibles, and maybe not shower every day. (The issue was eventually reprinted and is back on sale for list price.)

With WOW:TM on the horizon and Beckett Massive Online Gamer not getting any more readable no matter how hard I stare at it, I decided to take a look at EON to see if it offered any clue to what the WOW mag might be like. MMM was kind enough to spot me a couple of issues, and I have to say I'm very impressed.

What strikes you first is the design. Like what WOW:TM's braintrust emphasized in the original press blast, EON is about quality -- though it's only 84 pages an issue, the paper quality is obscenely fantastic, and the design's impeccable. Visually, the magazine is a bit like your typical Brit-mag (lots of box-outs and graphs, that sort of thing), but the design is artistic in approach, pretty to the eye and filled with details. It's a far cry from Beckett, and I think it provides a decent yardstick for WOW:TM to try and measure itself against. (One funny thing I noted: EON very rarely publishes photographs of actual people -- almost never, in fact, except for arty shots of CCP employees in the interview features. That's certainly different from Beckett MOG, which is packed with digicam grabs of frumpy, pasty-complexioned gamers.)

Being so devoted to a single game, EON has a couple of charming elements you won't see in any other mag. One is the advertising -- not for games or hardware, but things like EVE websites, services, and corporations (ie. guilds). You don't buy ads with real cash, but with ISK, the in-game currency -- 700 million for a full page, 1.4 billion if you want MMM to design it up for you. I suppose it's mainly a vanity thing for the corporations that throw ads in there, but it plays upon the advantages of print in covering a constantly-changing game. "Best of all," as EON itself puts it, "advertising makes your mark on EVE permanent."

The other, and I suppose this is what WOW:TM aims for as well, is depth. There's a little bit of fluff in every issue of EON (mostly in the fanfiction, which is at least very well illustrated), but the vast majority of pages contain serious hardcore game-oriented content -- alliance updates, ship reviews, CCP personnel interviews, and so on. Beginners aren't exactly thrown out by the ear, but they're expected to know the lingo, at the very least. For a complete non-player like me, I might as well try to read the Journal of the American Medical Association on the can. "Territory lies at EVE's heart," one article asks. "But the problems of empire building are becoming obvious. Is there a solution?" I don't know! Is there?

Kidding aside, even an outsider like myself can see that EON's carved out a nice niche for itself -- and, I guess, a profitable one, if they've stayed in business this long. If MMM can succeed with the EVE audience, then Future's got to have it in the bag covering the #1 MMO in the universe, right? In this sort of business, where reader dollars generate nearly 100% of your revenue, quality really does dictate success, I suppose -- that's what it'll all come down to.

[Kevin Gifford breeds ferrets and runs Magweasel, a really cool weblog about games and Japan and "the industry" and things. In his spare time he does writing and translation for lots and lots of publishers and game companies.]

Italian collector Alessandro Claudia put up one of the largest portable gaming collections I've ever seen up for auction (GameSniped believes it's "the biggest handheld collection ever surfaced on eBay".), offering 600 vintage handheld and tabletop electronic games -- from Acetronic's Chess Traveller to Yonezawa's Sicom 16.

The starting bid for the now-ended auction was a jaw-dropping $35,000. Alessandro doesn't expect to actually sell off his stockpile for that much; he's using the eBay listing to publicize that he's selling his 620+ games individually, accepting any reasonable offers for the titles. Most of the games are boxed and complete, and the collection includes a few unique and rare items.

The seller says he's abandoning this hobby due to undisclosed "personal reasons"; it's worth noting that he didn't start amassing this impressive collection until just three years ago! You can see photos for each of the games and read about how Alessandro's preserved them on his site.

[GameSetLinks is GameSetWatch's daily link round-up post, culling from hundreds of weblogs and outlets to compile the most interesting longform writing, links, and criticism on the art and culture of video games.]

Continuing a month or so's round-up of neat links (and on that front, we're going to have a new weekly column starting tomorrow that'll help defray things when GameSetLinks goes on hiatus at times!), here's some pieces you might have missed, starting with a Petz developer discussing the making of a fashionable franchise addition.

Also in here - a British childhood with a friend's influential dad, TV game oddness, physics-based Flash games, and a number of other esoterically compiled links that may or may not bring you joy. Hopefully the former.

Pen knife apple:

Expertologist » Dogz and Catz Living Together, Mass Hysteria
Wow, one of the creators of Petz Fashion: Dogz and Catz holds forth. And you know what - care goes into a game like this, too.

Elder Game: MMO game development » The Tragic Story of The Cussing NPCs
'The following story is an imagining of what may have led to the sad tale of the cussing NPCs in Champions Online. It is all conjecture based on past experiences with very similar issues.'

A Youth Well Wasted / Chapter Three « Collect
Ah, childhood nirvana: 'My best friend’s Dad was the Vice President of Sega Europe. Thanks to this I was afforded certain perks.'

CHEGheads Blog » POW! – The Original Online Game? - National Center for the History of Electronic Games
Wow, interesting TV game info here... and not the kind of TV game you're thinking about.

You've got to have faith | Dopass.com
'So, for the management teams of our industry, I have a question: How can we prove to you we've learned from our mistakes if you never allow us to be in the position to make those mistakes again?'

Byteside » Blog Archive » Margaret Pomeranz on R18+
Hey, a film critic (a prominent Australian one, apparently) willing to talk about games (and ratings) cogently. How nice, Mr. Ebert. (Via Critical Distance.)

Top 5 Physics-Based Flash Games | Bytejacker
I know, Top 5s, but Bytejacker are smart indie folks (watch their video show!) and I hadn't played most of these neat physics games.

A Tree Falling in the Forest: Apple's Attempt to Reinvent the Game Business: Selling the Razors Edition
'The iPod is a great platform and the technology is great, but when we consider our leverage on the existing platforms relative to where the music business sits today, I think it is an offer we can refuse.'

I held back on reporting HBO's recent trademark registration for a possible True Blood game -- it pained me to not plaster GameSetWatch with JPGs of Bill the vampire baring his canine teeth and snarling, "Sookeh is mine!" -- but this news of the premium cable channel filing a trademark registration for Eastbound & Down that includes "interactive electronic games" is just too much.

The full list of goods/services mentioned in the filing: "sports helmets, interactive electronic games, headphones, earphones and earbuds, mouse pads, [and] pre-recorded compact discs featuring music from an ongoing comedy television series."

What would an Eastbound & Down video game even entail? Jet ski stages with your coked out, topless "girlfriend"? Minigames in which you throw cinder blocks through car windows? A face-off at a used car lot sale where you have to strike out your baseball rival? Count me in! (also count me in for a Kenny Power autobiography book on tape, please).

And now, a very NSFW video of Kenny Powers best (or worst) moments:

[Via superannuation]